Waiting

The way it works is this...

You show up early and wait.

I don't even tie my fly on until I am on the bank...waiting.

Some folks pre-fish the hex hatch, dragging nymphs or swinging streamers or testing their hex patterns to see how they look, how they float. 

I don't.

I wait.

When a 9 inch brown slashes for a beetle, or a sulpher spinner, I don't cast.  I wait.

I've come to witness the emergence and (subsequent trout feeding frenzy) of the largest mayfly on our continent (maybe the world?)  Actually, I am not at all interested in the emergence and hatch of these mayflies.  I have come to see the largest trout specimens in this river, EAT these mayflies, on top, loudly...

It's worth it to wait. 

You get to see green, go gray, go black.  You get to see swallows skimming, bats diving, redwing blackbirds roosting (or maybe it's nesting).

Waiting makes the first mosquito an event that signals that the buff needs to be pulled up a little higher.  It also signals the beginning of things that happen after dark.  Mosquitoes and Hexagenia mayflies share a clock.  They hatch and really get humming at the same time.  If you aren't getting the blood drained out of your neck, knuckles and scalp (through your hip mesh trucker hat), you need to wait.

Tonight I waited, through the swallows, the bats, the redwing blackbirds and the mosquitos. 
And then, a lone trout rose to a mayfly I couldn't see.  I cast my fly, hooked the fish and released it.

I was tired of waiting.